


The Song of Forgetting

by NicoleAnell



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-24
Updated: 2012-06-24
Packaged: 2017-11-08 10:13:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/442088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NicoleAnell/pseuds/NicoleAnell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>written for bsg_kink hurt/comfort night, prompt: "Gaius/Caprica, her first cold."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Song of Forgetting

Earth does not always agree with the Cylons. Some say it's humanity, some even welcome the wondrous new experiences, the common colds and afflictions they must bear to truly know mortality. Or maybe they're being punished for their sins, for the brothers and sisters they left behind. The first outbreak hits them in the summer, and it proves blessedly not as fatal or easily-spread as the only other virus they've known. (When Caprica coughs, Gaius still remembers a raven-haired copy struggling to breathe and pushes the image quickly from his mind. He's paid for this, they've all paid for what they've done. He is loved by God.)  
  
And Gaius can't help but think the sickness  _does_  agree with Caprica. Wild-haired and flushed, she's bearing this beautifully. It's only her chapped lips and labored movements that make him ache for her. She covers her face again, bravely suppressing a gurgle of pain, and he catches a glimpse of her eyes shining with tears behind her hand.  
  
They're no longer afraid. They've only been told to stay away from children and the elderly, just as a precaution, and that's no one the Cylons haven't already been told to keep their distance from at one time or another. The earliest stricken have already come through the other side, stronger than ever. They've no reason to be afraid, but she hates this. She's never felt so powerless and vulnerable, even in her darkest moments, so forced to rely on the kindness of others, so prone to being left alone and disappointed.  
  
Gaius, however, can't seem to wait to indulge her. "Darling," he says as she staggers from their bed, "I'll bring you whatever you need." He wraps a blanket around her and she fights the urge to cry again. "Lie down and rest," he tells her. He's been too exposed already for any worries he can catch what she has. Their immunities are so different. They've no reason to be afraid. "You've always been the one taking care of me," he whispers adoringly as she tries to sleep. She hasn't, she'd argue if she weren't so miserable, she's only tried to fix what she ruined, but there's such an intensity of gratitude in his voice, and love - is this love?  
  
He prepares some grains and broth for her on the second day, when she's no longer retching (how that reminded her of Liam, how she shook from the nothing inside her) and she realizes how much she desperately wants to eat again. "I feel different," she tells him moments later. She's too uncertain to say t he word  _better._

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He wipes her face and body with a cool cloth, damp with fresh water from the lake, and watches her shiver and ease. "This always made me feel better," he tells her. His parents thought he was crazy, insisted he was only making his symptoms worse. Hydration, hydration, it clears up the sinus pathways, he would explain years later to his father, confidently pointing at a medical book, and Julius only shrugged and claimed he had no memory of ever telling him otherwise. "And that fancy book says to drink," he added infuriatingly, squinting at the line drawings on the page. "Don't remember you drinking. Remember you  _playing_  in it." Gaius remembers being hot, and suddenly feeling cool and cleaner; he remembers wiping his nose and letting it run blissfully into a neighbor's well, and someone had caught him and slapped him in the face and held him under (and even then it was almost relief, he was so terrified he forgot to be sick).  
  
"There," she moans, freeing him from his thoughts. She's responding to the water against on her chest, under her breasts and back above her heart, and he holds it there. "It feels like resurrection," she says fondly, letting nostalgia replace her own awful memories. He had not made the connection, and wishes even more he'd dragged a larger basin over for her. He soaks the cloth even more fervently and lets her rest her hand in the pool of water, touch herself straight to her forehead like a baptism.  
  
Later they lie together sleeplessly, with the blanket she's almost unconsciously rubbing between her legs, too much alive in her agony to not soothe herself this way. He joins her, briefly, his free hand adding to the friction against her, and it's shocking to her how suddenly the dull pain in her head evaporates, as if all her body needed was a distraction. (He remembers this, too.) She doesn't want the slow building pleasure to stop, would keep at the same dull pace all night if she could, but Gaius of course is more eager -- so eager to find what she needs, to take care of her -- he quickens her to an orgasm, panting and clutching at his body next to her. Her headache returns more gradually after she's finished, Gaius still tenderly stroking her hair and kissing her eyelids.  _Is this love?_  she thinks, and isn't afraid.

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End file.
